While Saudi Arabia’s first inscribed World Heritage Site, ?egra (al-?ijr) — Nabataean sister city of Petra — may be the best-known archaeological site in north-west Saudi Arabia, the region is extremely rich in cultural heritage beyond it. The special session Revealing Cultural Landscapes in North-west Arabia, included in the 54th Seminar for Arabian Studies (delayed from 2020 to 2021), presented the latest findings at a range of sites in this critical but understudied area of Saudi Arabia, showcasing a deep and complex past through many millennia.

Since the establishment of the Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU) in 2017, a result of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, extraordinary attention and resources have been exacted on the study of the archaeological assets and cultural heritage of al-?Ula County, within its oases and beyond, and shortly after of Khaybar, when parts came under RCU’s jurisdiction. A strategy and initial programme of research projects were established, and in 2019 the French Agency for the Development of AlUla (Afalula), the key partner of RCU, began sponsoring archaeological research as well. Unsurprisingly, therefore, recent work in al-?Ula and Khaybar predominate the volume.

The results and analyses offered in the articles derive from survey, extensive targeted excavation at multiple sites, and intensive excavation and studies at single sites. Together the papers present a range of recent discoveries that demonstrate north-west Arabia’s centrality to understanding the greater region and further, and to begin to clarify the extraordinary richness of life in this pivotal zone of the Arabian Peninsula from the Palaeolithic through to the Islamic period.